Shavian drama
21 April 2004. Inspired by .
It's been a fun 16 months, but the time has come for us to part our separate ways. It was a reasonably amicable split in the end - there was a little blood but no tears. I am no longer a bearded man.
It began as a symbol - of breaking away from London, offices and clients - just as my first contact lenses, aged 18, were the physical manifestation of how different I felt, post-school and abroad on my own.
Much of Western society frowns on facial hair, while also worshipping a bearded martyr who gained his whiskers around the 15th Century and kept them long after fashions had changed. Hiding your chin is one way of daring to be different.
My beard also began to take shape thanks to that natural curiosity that comes to every man at some point in his life, when faced with the chore of shaving: what would happen if I just didn't? Would it be the same fuzz you get when you leave yoghurt on the radiator? Or would it add a further boost of masculinity to my form, of the kind granted to the dangerous, the drop-outs and the (Brian) blessed?
The jury's out on the visual effect of my own attempt, but having a beard certainly opened up new avenues of personal definition. I, for the last 16 months, have been a bearded man. When describing me to others, it's the first thing people would say. No matter how short I trimmed it, I was bearded - even though, at times, it was shorter than it had been when I was clean-shaven and lazy. Then, I was smooth-chinned but scruffy. Subsequently, although the stubble was exactly the same length, I was bearded and tidy. It all depended on the starting point.
There was a dab of writer's chic involved in the growth of course, as well as a touch of laziness - what other act of apathy is also a creation of something new? - plus a desire to look older than my years as a budding freelancer. Now shaven, I look younger than my age - but like the contact lenses, 90% of it is inner confidence and bearing anyway.
But I regret not a single hair of it. I call out to those of you who can, who are hiding behind your smooth-chinned disguises, to throw off the shackles of well-defined jawlines. Inside every chin there are hairs waiting to burst out. I say, let it grow, get through that early, dodgy ginger phase and last until you need to buy a trimmer to keep it neat. Be a man. Be hairy. Be Brian. (Never go for a goatee though. That's just wrong.)
Meanwhile, I've gone the other way. I'm not saying never again, and it looked particularly dapper trimmed with a matching morning suit at a friend's wedding. But I'll probably wait for a few years or a long travelling stint before embarking on such a commitment again. I need a while to get used to the face looking back at me in the mirror.
For my brother Esau is an hairy man, but I - at least for now - am a smooth man.